see also
original title:
CittàGiardino
directed by:
cast:
Abdelaziz Ahmed El Achmaoui, Musa Fosi Fouad, Djelimakan Kanoute, Boubakar Djallo, Sulay Bah, Fofana Abou, Francesco Piccitto, Giusi Romano, Lidia Maltese, Antonio Alfano
screenplay:
cinematography:
editing:
producer:
production:
country:
Italy
year:
2018
film run:
54'
format:
colour
status:
Ready (15/01/2018)
festivals & awards:
Sicilian hinterland, summer.
The Città Giardino Help Centre for Immigrants is a dilapidated building squeezed between the mountains and the factories.
Città Giardino is closing and the only guests are six kids between 14 and 18 years old.
They come from Africa, they went across the desert and the sea and now they are waiting for a permit, a visa, a transfer directive.
The days pass the same, through sleep, meals and endless immersion in their smartphones. Heat, frustration and boredom paralyse the boys, under the look of an elderly watchman in charge of their supervision.
Even the visit of a journalist does not break the monotony: he has come to interview the young guests but the words barely come out.
None of them wants to tell about himself.
Omar trains in his improvised gym, Jallow looks for refuge in his tablet, Jelimakan prays. Only Sahid, a newcomer, seems determined to win the immobility: he is planning an escape.
He asks for help to his compatriot Farouq and succeeds in persuading him after some hesitancy .
In the following days, Sahid and Farouq develop their plan. Their preparations are interrupted by the arrival of a family visiting the Center.
Farouq, overcome by homesickness, approaches them hoping they would bring him to their home.
Sahid, envious, threatens to take revenge, but a sudden summer storm suspends any hostilities.
When the sun returns, bringing again the heat and the boredom, Sahid and Farouq finally decide to leave.
That will be the last night at the Centre.